The Case of the Incredible Disappearing Docket

Lucilla Najera has a new magic trick.

Abracadabra.

For more than a year, the data shows her court carrying around 2,500 pending cases every single month. Like clockwork, about 300 to 400 cases get disposed of monthly. Not glamorous. Not dramatic. Just steady government work.

Then November rolls around.

Campaign season stretches, yawns, and says good morning.

And by December?

Poof.

Backlog gone.

Two thousand five hundred cases just vanished like they caught a Greyhound out of town.

Lest anyone think I'm making this stuff up - the link above is to a folder with a trove of court records covering activity in her court for more than a year. Click the link and you can see for yourself. 

But let me show you the exact reference I made earlier. Here is the report from the Office of Court Administration for November of last year:

And here is a look at the following month:

Now before anyone says, “Wow, she must have worked really hard,” let’s slow down and sip some cafecito. Clearing cases is not the same as resolving them. When thousands of cases move off a court docket, the public should be able to clearly see how and why each one was handled.

Courts exist for due process, not for PowerPoint slides.

If 2,500 cases were legitimately resolved, dismissed, adjudicated, transferred, or otherwise handled according to law, there should be documentation. Orders. Dispositions. Paper trails. That is not optional. That is literally the job.

Instead, what the data shows is a court that consistently carried a heavy caseload all year, disposing of a few hundred at a time, then suddenly reporting zero pending cases right as a reelection campaign kicks off.

What timing.

What efficiency.

What a coincidence.

You cannot brag about “clearing a backlog” if the public cannot clearly see how that backlog was cleared. That is not accountability. That is marketing.

This is not about partisan politics. This is about public trust. When court numbers shift dramatically overnight, voters deserve clarity, not campaign slogans. Justice is measured by integrity, not headlines. It is measured by whether every case reflects proper documentation, lawful procedure, and respect for the people whose lives are tied to those files.

Because those 2,500 cases are not numbers.

They are tenants. Landlords. Small businesses. Traffic citations. Evictions. Families.

They are real people.

And real people deserve more than a disappearing act.

Judge Najera appears to have given voters another reason to ask serious questions. Again.

At some point, the issue is not the backlog.

It is credibility.

Najera has some explaining to do as to why - right as the campaign season is kicking off - she suddenly clears more cases in one month than any other month during her entire time on the bench without explanation.